Despite having a frame so slender she was once dubbed ‘Skeletal Spice’, Victoria Beckham piously declared in 2010 that she was banning unhealthily thin models from her catwalk shows.
However, the 41-year-old Fashion designer/Musician has provoked a barrage of criticism, after seeming to backtrack on her promise by sending a slew of painfully skinny models down the runway at her show in New York recently, which was attended by her husband David, 16-year-old son Brooklyn and American Vogue editor Anna Wintour Dailymail reported.
Hundreds of Victoria’s 15 million-strong social media following made their feelings known to the designer, inundating her with messages about her choice of models.
‘Another show of skeletons,’ one remarked, while another pointed out: ‘They don’t look healthy at all.’
Many commentators were particularly incensed by her decision to use scrawny-looking 17-year-old Peyton Knight to close the show.
Knight, who was first signed to a model agency at the tender age of 11, is just one year older than the minimum age recommended for catwalk shows by the Council of Fashion Designers of America.
‘You need to feed this girl… Please give her some food,’ begged one, while another demanded furiously: ‘Jesus, why don’t you just get a motorised skeleton to walk down your catwalks and release these poor girls from this bloody torture of having to starve themselves for a job.’
Victoria pointedly ignored the critics, however, posing for a picture with the teen and thanking her on Instagram for closing the show.
It’s not the first time Beckham has been slammed for her choice in models, after casting a particularly frail-looking girl for one of her collections earlier this year.
Despite the criticism online, Beckham said after the show: ‘It’s a collection for all shapes and sizes — I always say it, but I just want women to feel like the best versions of themselves.’
See photos of some of the models below:
